Sunday, August 2, 2009

While scanning images from old books, I often get caught up in the text--reading about countries that no longer exist or fairy tales no longer told.

This past week I've been scanning the most amazing hand-colored engravings of 16th-19th century French Fashions. The hair and hat descriptions are the best (think Marie Antoinette):

"We find the "Cascade of Saint-Cloud" style, consisting of a cataract of powered ringlets falling from the top of the head, the 'kitchen garden' style, with bunches of vegetables hooked in to the side-curls, the 'rural' style, with landscapes representing a hill-side, windmills which actually turned, a meadow crossed by a silver stream, with a shepherdess tending her sheep, mountains, a forest with a sportsman and his dog in pursuit of game, and so and so..."